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Thursday, November 10, 2005

Blair's terror laws defeated

Two flaky lefties on Just Left have made unrealistic and might I say 'typical lefty' comments on a post by Jordan on Tony Blair's failure to pass his anti-terror laws.

Idiot made the following comment:

Fourteen days was too long already. The police have the ability to amend charges at will, and when faced with a situation where they require more time to sift through masses of data (which is their excuse for this outrage), they can always charge a suspect with a lesser offence (say, posession of explosives, firearms, or whathaveyou) and add the big terrorism charges later.

Of course, that would require that they do actual work, rather than just rounding up the usual suspects and waiting for one of them to confess.

Whereas Oliver said:

I agree with Idiot/Savant that fourteen days was already too long. Where in God's name are we living when we find detainment-without-charge in any form acceptable?

Now I happen to know quite a lot about criminal law and its processes. I know how difficult it is for Police to keep up with the greater sophistication that crims now have. There is never enough Police here, or in the UK, to do the job properly. There never will be. It's a bit like that. And I know that in the war on terror there is an enemy which is very sophisticated and very decentralised. It is not a normal police enforcement issue. It therefore requires an abnormal legal/policing response.

What police want more than anything else when out there risking their lives for others is for the parliament to recognise that fact and to give them the law(s) they need to do the job not only effectively, but also successfully. Police just want to catch bad guys. I can bet my last dollar that the only thing police in UK just want to do is to catch terrorists and lock them up.

He said people would think it was "very odd" that given the advice of the police and security services, MPs had "decided to ignore their recommendation".

In heated exchanges at prime minister's questions, Mr Blair said: "We are not living in a police state but we are living in a country that faces a real and serious threat of terrorism."

Now back to the two lefty comments.

Habeus Corpus is a fundamental legal position. It pretty much means means everyone arrested has the right to have his case heard as quickly as possible. It also applies to people detained. There is a difference between arrested and detained, but these differences can be difficult to explain. In the UK, terrorists would not have been arrested, merely detained. But in the UK, Police are already permitted to question you for 48 hrs (I think) while they detain you whereas the Police here don't have that power at all. Police here have to charge you or release you. There are some exceptions, namely if they are processing you for drink driving. Then Police have the power to detain you while you carry out the tests.

Idiot thinks fourteen days is too long. Yes it is longer than the 48 hrs for 'normal' crims but when dealing with suspected terrorists it is only 12 days more than that timeframe. And as I say, when you're dealing with an unusually sophisticated, decentralised enemy I think 14 days is easily justifiable. The Parliament allowed 28 days. I can live with that.

But Idiot is confused when he says 'the police have the ability to amend charges at will, and when faced with a situation where they require more time to sift through masses of data (which is their excuse for this outrage), they can always charge a suspect with a lesser offence (say, posession of explosives, firearms, or whathaveyou) and add the big terrorism charges later'.

The charging of any offence is irrelevant for the law just passed. The Police want the ability to detain without charge as a means of prevention of terrorist acts. They can always charge the suspect when/if they feel like it within the 28-day period but that is not the purpose of what the Police wanted.

And as for Oliver's, 'where in God's name are we living when we find detainment-without-charge in any form acceptable?' We are living on a different planet than you. That's for sure. Move in too early and there is not enough evidence. Move too late and you clean up the mess. We are not living in a normal world now Oliver.

Those arseholes pollies who voted against the 90 days should be made to explain their reasoning to the families of the dead and injured in the London bombings.Bet they havent got the guts to do that.Like our little leftie morons they are more worried about locking up the bad guys than they are about protecting the innocent.My blood boils when I read the pathetic ramblings of these pricks the terrorists are laughing at thgem they cant believe their luck that these shitbags are all on their side